WASHINGTON, Oct. 17 (Xinhua) -- Donations to the U.S. biggest charities dropped sharply last year, as people appeared to be less generous in a still struggling economy, according to a new report released on Sunday.

Donations to the nation's biggest charities dropped 11 percent last year, a decline that was the worst in the two decades since the Chronicle of Philanthropy, a biweekly newspaper that covers the noNPRofit world, started its Philanthropy 400 ranking of the organizations that raise the most from private sources.

The drop in contributions was nearly four times as great as the next biggest annual decrease: 2.8 percent in 2001, when charities also struggled to raise money from recession-battered donors, said the report.

The 400 institutions in the survey raised a total of 68.6 billion dollars in 2009. The median amount raised by charities on the Philanthropy 400 also declined last year to 98.8 million dollars, down from 105 million dollars in 2008.

The case for 2010 is not expected to get much better, as the recovery remains sluggish and the unemployment rate is still near 10 percent, according to the report.